Gerald H. Baker

Counsel

Gerald Baker is one of the most able and high-profile personal injury attorneys in the nation. Animated, ever cheerful and possessing a great sense of purpose, Baker has deep roots in fighting for the legal rights of workers and victims of negligence. Son of the prominent, street-smart Hoboken attorney Nathan Baker, Jerry has his own pedigree – he went to Cornell University and later Yale Law School. (“It’s all I knew and all I ever wanted to do,” says Baker about becoming an attorney.) Jerry’s father represented immigrant families of longshoremen and seamen and built a reputation as a leading admiralty law attorney.

By 1982 Jerry had succeeded his father as managing partner of the firm, which was founded in the 1920s. Over the years, Baker’s cases have included groundbreaking personal-injury cases, and major high-profile claims as well. He has represented the families of TWA Flight 800, Korean Airlines Flight 007 and Egyptair Flight 990. Such cases routinely led to seven-figure settlements, and bolstered Baker’s reputation as one of the nation’s leaders of personal-injury law.

In 2002, he obtained a verdict of $53 million against Conrail in a wrongful death case representing the family of a conductor who was survived by a wife and two young children. This was the largest wrongful death verdict in the history of New Jersey and one of the top 50 verdicts in the United States in 2002. Baker is New Jersey’s foremost expert on automobile insurance and he has argued many cases as amicus curiae on behalf of ATLA-NJ and the New Jersey State Bar Association.

Baker’s wood-paneled office, cluttered with case files, looks out over the Hudson river and New York City. (On the morning of September 11, Baker was on the last subway train to pass under The World Trade Center; today he represents, at no charge, the families of several 9/11 victims.) Indeed, Baker is passionate about his profession’s abiding virtue – that of affecting social justice and social change.

His firm’s four partners all focus on personal-injury law, and each year they handle scores of cases, including aviation, automobile, railroad, products liability, medical malpractice and maritime law. He was born, raised and resides in New Jersey.

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